Marlins hope Alex Sanabia’s second start ends like his first

Right-hander Alex Sanabia isn’t putting any extra pressure on himself to impress during whatever time he has in the Marlins rotation.
Sanabia makes his second start of the season tonight against the Braves. He was ticketed for the Class AAA New Orleans rotation until the day before the season opener when starters Henderson Alvarez and Nathan Eovaldi were placed on the disabled list with ailing shoulders.

Sanabia and prospect Jose Fernandez were handed those spots and Sanabia responded with six shutout innings and a victory in the Marlins lone win of the season, 7-5, over the Mets on Friday.

“That last start was something to build off of and look forward,” Sanabia said.

Sanabia was the beneficiary of the Marlins’ lone offensive explosion of the season. Miami has scored nine runs in its other seven games, all losses.

The win was Sanabia’s first in the big leagues since Sept. 22, 2010. He pitched in just 17 games with New Orleans last season while making three trips to the minor league DL and missed the 2011 season with a right elbow strain.

Now, Sanabia is hoping to give the Marlins something to think about when Alvarez and Eovaldi return, which should be, at least for Henderson, sometime in early May.

But that is not on his mind.

“There’s already enough pressure,” he said. “Adding more is not good. I’m in the moment right now. I’m not worried about what happened yesterday or what’s going to happen tomorrow. Focus on today. There’s no pressure now.

BULLPEN HEATING UP

Manager Mike Redmond believes getting out of the cold weather that the Marlins faced in Washington and New York on their first road trip has helped the bullpen.

After Sunday’s meltdown by closer Steve Cishek, the bullpen has recovered in the first two games of the Braves series, allowing just one run in five innings. Chad Qualls, John Maine and John Rauch each have thrown a scoreless inning. A.J. Ramos gave up a run in his two innings Tuesday.

“They’re just getting more comfortable,” Redmond said. “I think that cold weather was tough on guys. You see the velocities have ticked up quite a bit from the road to here. We’re aggressive in the strike zone. We’re going at guys. We’re giving ourselves a chance to win every single night.”

WHO’S ON FIRST?

Chris Valaika.

Valaika makes his first start at first base today in his career. Ever. That includes Little League.

“That’s a new addition,” Valaika said about his role as a utility player. “But it was always in the back of my head I needed to know the position.”

Valaika, 27, has played second, third and shortstop in 708 minor league games and 35 in the big leagues. But the Marlins, desperate with a rash of injuries at the position and veteran Greg Dobbs needing time off, have had Valaika taking grounders at first since late in spring training.

“Perry Hill has had these guys out there playing first,” Redmond said about his infield coach. “We need some other guys to play. He’s the guy we’re going to put out there against that lefty.”

Redmond’s lineup against left-hander Mike Minor is his eighth different one in nine games.